Set up a Windows PC as a kiosk

Set up a Windows touchscreen PC so it runs your mypreorder kiosk full screen in Microsoft Edge, and nothing else. Do it once per kiosk, signed in to Windows with the PC's administrator account.

Before you start

• Windows 10 or 11 Pro, Enterprise or Education. Windows Home can't run a kiosk (Assigned Access).
• The kiosk's web address: https://kiosk.mypreorder.com, or your brand's own, such as https://yourbrand-kiosk.mypreorder.com. We tell you which.
• The kiosk's device login (its sign-in email and password), from Users → Kiosk devices in the merchant portal. See Add a POS or Kiosk device.
• A keyboard plugged in while you set it up.

1. Prepare Windows

Microsoft's guides are Prepare a device for kiosk configuration and Assigned Access recommendations. These matter most for a kiosk:

• Updates restart outside trading hours. Set Windows Update's active hours to cover your trading hours. A restart signs the kiosk out, so an update at lunchtime takes it down until someone signs it back in.
• The screen never sleeps. In the power settings, set both turning off the screen and sleep to Never when plugged in.
• Hide the power options. In Group Policy: User Configuration → Administrative Templates → Start Menu and Taskbar → Remove and prevent access to the Shut Down, Restart, Sleep, and Hibernate commands: Enabled.
• Automatic sign-in of the Windows kiosk account (you create it in step 4) after a restart or power cut. This gets Windows back to the kiosk account. The kiosk itself still needs its own sign-in again.
• Leave display scaling as it is. The kiosk sizes its screens from the screen's size, whatever Windows scaling is set to.
• The screen's native resolution (most kiosk screens: 1920 × 1080), turned to portrait in Windows' display settings, not just mounted that way. Otherwise the kiosk sees a landscape screen. Any other resolution only makes it blurrier. A 4K screen: keep 4K and set scaling to 200%.

2. Check the screen size

In Edge, open the kiosk's address followed by /about/diagnostics, for example https://kiosk.mypreorder.com/about/diagnostics. No sign-in is needed. Its Screen section should show:

• Physical: your screen's resolution the portrait way round, such as 1080 × 1920.
• Orientation: portrait.
• Root font size: 20px at 100% scaling. Smaller at a higher scaling is fine: the layout looks the same.

3. Lock Edge to the kiosk's address

Set three Edge policies now, before you create the kiosk, so it can't open any other website: Lock Microsoft Edge to the kiosk's address.

4. Create the kiosk (Assigned Access)

Microsoft's guide is Set up a single-app kiosk.

1. Open Settings → Accounts → Other users (Windows 10: Family & other users), and under Set up a kiosk select Get started. You can also search Settings for "kiosk".
2. Name the Windows kiosk account. Windows creates it as a local, standard account.
3. Choose Microsoft Edge.
4. Choose As a digital sign or interactive display: one website, full screen. Not As a public browser, which has tabs and an address bar.
5. Enter the kiosk's web address.
6. Set the idle time to 0. Don't accept the 5-minute default. If it won't take 0, enter the largest number it allows.
7. Finish, close Settings, sign out of Windows and sign in as the kiosk account.

Edge opens full screen on Kiosk Device Sign In. Sign it in and pair the terminal: see Sign in a POS or Kiosk and pair the EFTPOS terminal.

Why the idle time must be 0

Edge's kiosk mode always runs InPrivate, so whatever the kiosk keeps, its sign-in included, is thrown away when Edge closes. Edge's idle reset works by closing Edge, which Windows then opens again. With the 5-minute default, every quiet spell would leave the kiosk on its sign-in screen.

The kiosk has its own idle handling instead. When nobody touches it, it asks "Still there?", clears an abandoned order and goes back to its start screen, and it stays signed in.

A restart, update or power cut closes Edge too, so the kiosk comes back on its sign-in screen and needs signing in once. Its EFTPOS pairing comes back with the sign-in.

5. Check it before you leave

Unplug the keyboard first: Windows shows its touch keyboard only when no keyboard is attached.

• A test order: pay on the terminal, and the docket prints.
• Tap Name for the order at checkout: the touch keyboard appears. If it doesn't, see The on-screen keyboard doesn't appear on the kiosk.
• Leave the kiosk alone for 10 minutes. It goes back to its start screen, and it's still signed in when you tap it.
• Long-press a menu photo, some text and anything that looks like a link: no menu appears and nothing opens.
• Restart the PC. Windows signs in to the kiosk account by itself, and the kiosk asks for its sign-in once, but not for the pairing. If Windows stops at its own sign-in screen, turn on automatic sign-in (step 1).

If something is not right